On 3 and 4 April 2023, the San Francisco University in Quito hosted the Ninth International Conference on eDemocracy & eGovernment (ICEDEG). The conference, with participants working in Latin America, North America, Europe, and Africa, had a scientific program that included paper sessions, keynote speeches, and tutorials on various topics related to the public sector’s digital transformation all over the globe were addressed and discussed.
Two UNU-EGOV researchers, Demetrios Sarantis and João Martins, participated in the conference. On the first day’s morning session, João Martins presented a paper entitled Digital Transformation of the Public Sector in the Americas: an empirical analysis to identify leap-froggers and trends since 2003, written in co-authorship with Morten Meyerhoff Nielsen, EGOV Advisor at the Operating Unit. This paper overviews the main digital government trends in the American continent over the last two decades and proposes an empirical approach to identify best practice cases.
In the afternoon session, Demetrios Sarantis presented a paper entitled Design and Implementation of Hospital Online Services: In-depth Assessment of Greece, written in co-authorship with Stylianos Papadopoulos from the University of Aegean, UNU-EGOV’s Director Delfina Soares, and Senior Research Assistant Joana Carvalho. This paper presented the results of applying the Health Sector Website Assessment Instrument (HSWAI) to 240 Greek Hospitals.
On the second day’s afternoon session, Demetrios Sarantis conducted a tutorial entitled Health Sector Online Services, an Assessment Methodology, in which he explained the HSWAI in detail and instructed the participants in simulating an assessment of an Ecuadorian hospital website. This tutorial also had contributions from Alexandre Barbosa (CETIC.br), Patricia Acosta-Vargas (Universidad de Las Americas), and Manuel Francisco Tupia Anticona (Pontificia Universidad Católica del Perú). The three speakers shared their perspective regarding health sector websites status and their experience assessing the health sector website accessibility in Brazil, Ecuador, and Peru.
More information about the conference and its scientific program can be found here.